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Extraordinary Canadians: Lord Beaverbrook

by David Adams Richards


Overview:
Millionaire lumber man, financier, press baron, Max Aitken always attracted both approval and criticism in equal measure. He was an irrepressible entrepreneur, rising from modest beginnings in New Brunswick to become the world's most powerful newspaperman and a British Lord by the age of forty. He counselled kings and statesmen, bedded scores of women, supported Canadian art, and became Winston Churchill's invaluable wartime minister. Yet despite his loyalty and service to the British empire, Beaverbrook was mostly derided by English society as an overly ambitious colonial. Novelist David Adams Richards, the bard of Miramichi, brings unique insight into the life of his fellow New Brunswicker, Max Aitken, reminding us of why he mattered then, and why he matters now.